DISPATCHES

CIVIL RIGHTS REPORT SCORES FLA.

Its two Republican commissioners wanted no part of it, and Gov.
Jeb Bush said it "needlessly fosters racial disharmony," but the US
Commission on Civil Rights reported that state officials ignored
problems that denied the right to vote to countless residents, most
of them minorities. Among other things, the panel noted that 51% of
those incorrectly struck from the voter rolls on the suspicion of
being felons were actually African Americans whose names resembled
those of felons. The panel also heard from Allan Lichtman, chair of
American University's department of history and a veteran voting
rights lawyer, that 14.4% of ballots cast by Florida's
African-American voters were rejected, compared to a 1.6% rejection
rate for non-blacks. He studied the rejection rates in predominantly
black precincts of Dade, Duval and Palm Beach counties, which
accounted for 47% of bad ballots.

Greg Palast, who reported on the improper purge of suspected
felons from the Florida voter rolls for the BBC, the British
newspaper The Observer, Salon.com and The Nation, noted
in a column in the Washington Post that since the election 10
states have adopted computer-aided purges of centralized voter
records similar to Florida's flawed system and 16 other states are
considering them.

Palast noted that Florida contracted with Database Technologies
(later bought by ChoicePoint Inc. of Atlanta) to cross-match a list
of convicted felons with voter rolls. In June 2000, on the basis of
ChoicePoint's results, the Florida Division of Elections ordered
county election officials to remove some 58,000 names from voter
rolls unless the counties had evidence that they were not convicted
felons. One of those 58,000 was Linda Howell, who is Madison County's
election supervisor and has never committed a felony. Another was the
Rev. Willie D. Whiting Jr., whose rap sheet contains a single traffic
ticket. "His biggest 'crime' was his resemblance on paper to Willie
J. Whiting (no Jr.), a convicted felon born two days after the
reverend," Palast wrote.

Fortunately, Whiting lives in Leon County -- which, alone among
Florida's 67 counties, independently researched every name on its
scrub list. The county could only verify that 34 of the 694 cited --
5% -- actually had criminal records. Because officials already were
skeptical of the list, Whiting was able to convince them he should be
permitted to vote when he turned up on Election Day.

Researchers from Salon.com who investigated lists in 13 Florida
counties found that at least 15% of the names should not have been
there. ChoicePoint spokesmen subsequently told Palast "they don't
dispute that figure, and they consider it a reasonable rate of
error."

If Salon's 15% error figure is right -- and data like Leon
County's indicates it is much higher -- almost 9,000 of the 58,000
names on the scrub list belonged to rightful voters. "Furthermore,"
Palast wrote, "2,883 other names belonged to people convicted of
felonies in states that restore voting privileges after a sentence is
served. These people were also purged -- even though they should not
have lost their civil rights merely by moving to Florida."

A Fox News poll, taken June 6 to 7, found 58% of the public gets
angry when they are "thinking of how ... votes were counted" in
Florida's 2000 presidential contest, while 28% say that they are
"satisfied." Even 36% of Republicans are still mad.

O'NEILL GETS STOCK WINDFALL. Two months after Treasury
Secretary Paul O'Neill agreed to sell $100 million in stock in Alcoa,
the aluminum company he used to run, O'Neill still had not fully
divested and refused to say how much stock he has left in his former
company, Jake Tapper reported on Salon.com on June 7. By delaying his
sale of the stock, Tapper noted, O'Neill could have reaped a $62
million windfall as the stock price has soared 30% in recent months
-- in part because of federal government initiatives. O'Neill on
March 25 said he would sell his stock. In April, federal officials
asked aluminum producers to halt or reduce their production for up to
two years in order to conserve energy. The news was a bonanza for the
industry, Tapper noted, as it became clear that the aluminum supply
would decrease, demand was certain to rise. A Treasury spokeswoman
said that O'Neill had sold some of his stock, but would not say how
much, refusing to characterize his transaction as either large or
small, saying only that "it will all be gone by June 22. His
financial advisors are selling pieces of it on a routine basis."
Charles Lewis, executive director of the Center for Public Integrity,
a government watchdog group, said, "One of the sad truths of
Washington is you can't take people at their word anymore on
anything." He added, "When we hear people are selling their stocks,
silly us -- we actually thought he was selling it."

BUSH PROTESTERS BUSTED IN FLA. When George W. Bush spoke at
Legends Stadium in Tampa, Fla., June 4, in an event that was
advertised as open to the public, three elderly protesters were
arrested, handcuffed and hustled out of the stadium for attempting to
wave signs. Janis Marie Lentz, 55, of New Port Richey, Mauricio
Rosas, 37, of Tampa, and Sonja Haught, 59, of Clearwater, were each
charged with trespassing, police said. Haught also was charged with
disorderly conduct because police say she tried to resist arrest.
Police had relegated protesters to a "First Amendment Zone" a third
of a mile from the stadium, but several protesters carried
letter-sized signs that said: "Investigate Florida Votergate" into
the stadium. Once inside, Haught told the St. Petersburg
Times, when one of the protesters unveiled a gay-pride sign,
somebody grabbed it and Haught felt her purse being pulled as her
"Votergate" signs were being yanked away. Tampa police officers
arrived at the scuffle, took the signs and handcuffed the three
protesters. During the events one of them fell or was pushed into an
81-year-old protester who lay on the ground bleeding from a cut on
the head. A Secret Service spokesman told the Times that his
agency was not involved in removing protesters, but said rally
organizers were within their rights because it was a private event.
However, the Times noted that the White House organized the
rally with local supporters at Legends Field, a publicly financed
stadium, and the public at large was invited to hear the president.
The Times editorialized that the police response was "a
cowardly exercise in suppressing legitimate protest." It added that
the use of "First Amendment zones" isolated from political events is
unacceptable. "All of the United States is a First Amendment
zone."

D'S 'COME HOME' ON FAST TRACK. Two influential House
Democrats who supported the North American Free Trade Agreement, Rep.
Martin Frost of Texas and Rep. Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota, have
joined the "Fair Trade" bloc in Congress and are working to defeat
George W. Bush's request for "Fast Track" approval to negotiate a
Free Trade Agreement of the Americas. Michael Dolan of Public
Citizen's Global Trade Watch said citizen action is needed because,
while many Congress members claim to support Fair Trade, which
demands labor and environmental standards as part of the trade deal,
"unless we lock them down firmly, a fair amount of them are
susceptible to support a Fast Track proposal that merely mentions the
words 'labor' and 'environment' but that has toothless enforcement
mechanisms or otherwise is nothing but Fast Track and a fig leaf."
Republican House leaders are promoting a "clean" bill that would only
grant fast-track approval procedures to trade agreements without
labor and environmental provisions. You can phone your Congress
member via the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121. Ask to speak with
the person who handles trade issues, and explain that you hope the
member will sign on to the "Dear Colleague" letter about Fast Track
from Reps. Frost and Pomeroy on Fast Track.

PRO-DEMOCRACY CONVENTION. The Center for Constitutional
Rights and more than 50 organizations are sponsoring a National
Pro-Democracy Convention in Philadelphia June 29 to July 1. With the
Voter's Bill of Rights as a primary focus, the Convention will be a
vehicle to gather up and galvanize the disparate and disaffected
constituencies and movements outraged by the flawed election to build
a permanent force for real democracy. A National Town Hall Meeting
will feature John Anderson (Center for Voting and Democracy), Melanie
Campbell (National Coalition for Black Civic Participation), Rep.
John Conyers (D-Mich.), Granny D (Alliance for Democracy), Ron
Daniels (Center for Constitutional Rights), Cheri Honkala (Kensington
Welfare Rights Union), Arianna Huffington (author), Rev. Jesse
Jackson (Rainbow/PUSH), Martin Luther King III (Southern Christian
Leadership Conference), Rev. Al Sharpton (National Action Network),
and June Zeitlin (Women's Economic and Development Organization), to
name a few. There will also be workshops and plenaries on the
principles outlined in the Voters' Bill of Rights and strategies for
strengthening the pro-democracy movement. To register or for more
information, see www.pro-democracy.com, e-mail demconv@hotmail.com or
contact the Center for Constitutional Rights at 212-614-6452.

BUSH SUPPORT PLUMMETS. George W. Bush's overall job
approval was down 8 points, to 55%, in a Washington Post/ABC
News Poll released June 4. Respondents said by a 2-1 margin -- 41% to
20% -- that recent changes that gave Democrats control of the Senate
are good for the country. The survey found that Bush should
compromise with Democrat-ic lawmakers on energy policy, patients'
rights, Social Security and other top issues, the Post
reported. The number of Americans who disapprove of Bush's handling
of the energy situation has increased 15 points, to 58%, while
Democrats had almost a 20-point lead over Bush on handling of the
environment -- 54% to 35%, and 56% think the federal government
should set limits on the wholesale price of electricity. Bush's
energy plan is weighted toward increasing production of oil, coal and
natural gas, as well as nuclear power. Democrats contend the plan
would benefit the energy industry without lowering prices for
consumers.

Democrats now hold a 42% to 40% lead over the president on the
question of who should set the nation's policy agenda. Even the $1.35
trillion tax cut has generated more ambivalence than political payoff
for Bush and the GOP. Some 58% approved of Bush's tax cut. But an
even larger majority said they would have preferred it if the
president had spent the money on popular programs such as education
and Social Security.

MASS. CLEAN ELECTIONS AT RISK. State legislators are still
resisting appropriating $10 million to implement Clean Elections in
Massachusetts. Voters enacted the initiative, similar to Maine and
Arizona models, by a margin of 2-1 in 1998, but they left it up to
legislators to set aside the money to finance campaigns for statewide
and legislative candidates who agree to limit their contributions and
expenses. In the past two sessions, the law's opponents have tried to
gut it, each time backing down in the face of protests. This year the
Massachusetts House, at the behest of Speaker Tom Finneran -- a
Democrat who specializes in incumbent protection -- voted May 1 to
defund the law, eliminating its annual $10 million appropriation and
shifting its funding solely to voluntary taxpayer checkoffs on their
tax returns. Senate President Tom Birmingham, another Democrat, has
promised to fight for the Clean Elections funding, but in The
Nation, Micah Sifry of Public Campaign, which advocates public
financing, noted, "The climactic fight to restore the law's funding
will come in mid-to-late June, when the state budget goes to
conference and the real bargaining occurs." For more information, see
www.massvoters.org (Mass Voters for Clean Elections, phone
617-451-5999) or www.publicampaign.org (Public Campaign, phone
202-293-0222).

CHUY'S PAYBACK FOR BUSH TWINS' TROUBLE. The First Twins
were charged with being minors in possession of alcohol, a Class C
misdemeanor, but the Republican-controlled Texas Alcoholic Beverage
Commission may get their revenge on Chuy's, the restaurant whose
manager turned in Jenna Bush for using someone else's ID to buy a
margarita. The liquor cops decided to investigate the popular
restaurant for serving drinks to Barbara Bush and another minor. (Not
that the White House would stoop to retaliation!) Republican
activists also have posted on the Internet personal information on
the bar manager, including her address, birthdate, drivers license
information, physical description, and even birth information about
her infant child, along with calls for punitive actions, according to
Salon.com. The Austin American-Statesman, which originally
played down the Chuy's bust, editorialized June 9 that Jenna
apparently received preferential treatment when she was cited for a
Class C misdemeanor rather than the more serious Class B usually
given to minors trying to buy alcohol with phony IDs. "Statistics
from Austin Municipal Court show that most minors cited for using
false ID to buy alcohol receive the higher charge. In what can only
be described as a wry twist of fate, the twins' father, when he was
governor, signed the 1999 law increasing the charge for using false
identification to purchase alcoholic beverages" the newspaper noted.
"... Now Chuy's faces an inquiry from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage
Commission for having served underage customers using phony IDs. The
TABC should be careful that it doesn't compound one possible abuse of
official power with another by harassing Chuy's for following the
law."

HAHN WINS LA MAYOR. James Hahn, a moderate Democrat and
longtime city attorney, put together a coalition of black and white
voters to beat an aggressive campaign from Antonio Villaraigosa, the
former state Assembly Speaker who had hoped to be the city's first
Hispanic mayor in more than a century. Hahn, 50, won with 54% of the
vote in the runoff race. Villaraigosa, 48, had the support of
organized labor, the Democratic Party, the Los Angeles Times
and outgoing Mayor Richard Riordan, but Hahn counted on support from
black voters who remembered his father as well as white voters in the
San Fernando Valley who responded to Hahn's advertisements depicting
Villaraigosa as soft on crime and drug abuse. Villaraigosa, 48, the
son of a Mexican immigrant, grew up in East Los Angeles and was a
former union organizer. In another race, progressive former state
legislator Tom Hayden apparently lost a race for City Council by less
than 300 votes, but the Times reported that the new council is
likely to invest more heavily in affordable housing and measures to
address homelessness, increase the number of "living-wage" jobs,
concentrate more closely on the environment and press harder for
reform at the Los Angeles Police Department.

ORGANIZATION FOR COMPETITIVE MARKETS addresses the most
pressing issues in the food and agriculture subeconomy at its 2001
Food and Agriculture Conference July 19-20 at the Radisson Hotel
Opryland in Nashville, Tenn. The first day will focus on new
initiatives to create competition, while the second day will focus on
confronting the problems stemming from the consolidated industry
structure in the food and agriculture sectors. Phone OCM at
662-476-5568, email ocm@competitivemarkets.com or see
www.competitivemarkets.com.